sun in your eyes
by mirajens
Summary: He never thought he could love her any more than he already did. (miraxus mr & mrs smith au)
1. bones that shake

****bones that shake****  
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 _ _(after)__

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He comes home some time after 4 am, tracking blood into the threshold and smelling of lighter-fluid on his clothing. His joints creak and his back aches as he climbs the Oakwood staircase and treks down the long hallway to the wing that holds the master bedroom. He's a little too tired and sore to be subtle or considerate so he shoulders the double doors open with a loud grunt (he forgets how his arms smart) and immediately, there are hands on his face, on his body, checking for more injuries.

"There's a huge stain on the carpet in the parlor. I'll help you clean it out tomorrow." he says, grinning at his wife despite the cut on his lip.

Mirajane's assessment of his injuries stop and a manic sort of laughter breaks away from her lips. "I never liked that rug anyway." Then she takes his hand and leads him into the bathroom.

He's stripped to his underwear and seated on the lid of the toilet as he recounts the mission gone wrong because he might be a killer but he can't stand the feel of antiseptic seeping into his wounds. He also doesn't miss the tears that are caught in her lashes, or how her lips are set in a line. So he talks. Its easy to babble when things are bad. He describes bombs going off here and there, Freed taking a hit to the head that makes Evergreen worry still, tricky traps that takes muscle and lazers to resolve. He tells his wife of the hired muscle he'd come across tonight (the same ones he'd killed). Vicious creatures, especially the lady with the _sai_. The one who put the slash on his ribs and the stab wound just inches from his heart. He jokes about her shitty aim. Anyone could have finished off someone as injured as he had been.

With that tasteless jest, he feels her composure shatter as palpable and loud as glass breaking. This is when her hands begin to tremble and he can hear her breath come like a broken thing. The fingers that hold the needle and thread going in and out of his shoulder painfully is now incapable of action.

He feels the first tear fall on his lap. He's hurting all over but he aches to comfort so his uninjured arm goes around her waist to draw her close. He buries his face in the softness of her chest and God, she smells like what coming home feels like. "I'm fine, okay?"

She kisses him instead of replying. His cheeks are smushed between her palms as she presses an open mouth desperately to his. When her heart calms and the blood in her head quiets, she turns away from him to dispose of gauze and needle. "Come to bed, dummy, before I worry anymore."

The relief that swarms him is great and he finds himself taking her proffered arm and pulling her to his good side. "Any chance the injured will get some sweet ass tonight or what?"

"You are oddly sexy covered in bandage and smelling of blood and antiseptic but no. We cant have you bleeding on the expensive sheets Lucy gave us." she presses a quick kiss to the bandaged wound as her arm goes around his waist and she starts leading him to bed. "Sleep, my dragon. You have a full day of getting chewed out by your wife tomorrow."

* * *

 **note:** I have decided to make this a multichapter compilation of my Mr and Mrs Smith AU! I loved that movie and I loved conceptualizing a Miraxus version of it so here I am. The chapters will not be in progressive order, they will more or less be oneshots from the same universe posted at my leisure.

 _Each chapter will be labelled with_ _ **before**_ _and_ _ **after**_ _. If I feel like it, there will even be some_ _ **during**_ _chapters. If you've watched Mr and Mrs Smith, you know that John and Jane eventually find out that the other is an assassin working for competitive agency. Before will refer to the events before they find out. During and after will be easy enough to figure out._


	2. sun in your eyes

**sun in your eyes**  
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 _(before)_

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Fire burning. That's the sensation behind his ribs as he opens the back door that leads to the breakfast nook and kitchen, the smell of his favorite pot roast washing over him as easily as the sentiment of home did, but it doesn't take away the hurt he feels and can't release because there's no one he can kill for the fact that his grandfather is now dead.

He walks further into the nook until he finds his young wife just taking a roasting pan from the oven. It's a little over midnight and she's making dinner. Probably for him. He's reminded it's their anniversary and he cancelled dinner at that French place that took at least 3 months to book. He almost feels sorry for it, but he quite can't feel anything but misery because how can he when he spent the morning signing the death release of the old man who raised him?

She straightens from her bent angle, lips quirking up despite all the disappointments he's sure he's given her tonight. Pot roast in hand and the biggest comfort he can ever hope for or need plastered on her face in the form of a tiny smile, Laxus feels something sing in his chest and for once today, it's not something agonizing.

"Welcome home," is her greeting, her smile growing into a grin as she watches him come to her.

He presses his lips against her temple and for a while he can't speak, overwhelmed by gratitude and love. "Good to be back."

* * *

They're sitting by the fireplace when the table is clean and the dishes are done. He's propped against the backrest of the settee while she's on her back with her feet on his lap. A soft tune sounds from her closed lips and if he concentrates hard enough, he can feel the rise and fall of her torso. He wants to say a lot of things. He wants to apologize for the curt call from earlier ("Cancel dinner, will you? I can't leave right now.") or how he doesn't have any flowers or diamonds for her, or how he's never even given her a thought until he came home and saw her. How his grandfather's been in the hospital for months now. How the old man was often more asleep than he was awake. How this morning when Laxus came for a visit, his grandfather was already dead. How he's been handling paper work all day, how for the first time in his life, he's had to plan a funeral. No guests. Just Laxus and a priest because his grandfather was religious. His hands close over the delicate shape of her feet and the lullaby comes to a stop. "I promise I'll make this up to you." he finally says, because it's all he can think about and right now, he doesn't need to feel that he's a shitty husband on top of being a shitty grandson.

"Do you think you need to?" she asks in response. He smiles because marriage isn't supposed to be this easy. It's been a year and they don't even fight about the house temperature even though he likes it really cold and she likes it really warm. "I don't even have a gift for you and I stood you up."

She shrugs as if to say shit happens and he thinks he falls in love just a little bit more. She's unknowingly a great wife to an assassin."You'll get to it. I have something for you, though."

She produces a small, velvet box from her slacks and tosses it in a low arch into his palms. He feels her eyes on him as he opens it and sees diamond and platinum. Laxus already knows these will always be his favorite cuff links. "Here I thought you'd get me that leaf blower you've been joking about," he pushes the joke out of his lips even though his throat hurts and he's pretty sure his heart is going to drop into the pits of his stomach. There's also a sting in his eyes, but he won't cry.

Instead of answering she reaches up and draws him into her arms and he feels the modicum of self-preservation crumble. He melts into her form; he's so tired now and his mind won't stop reeling. His lashes are surely wet and he's glad she can't see but her arms tightening around his neck beg to differ. Some small part of him wonders if she knows, but that's impossible. He wants her to know, but he can't drag her into his web of lies so he settles for the warmth she emanates and the love she gives but he's not sure he deserves. There's still comfort in that.

* * *

 **note** : So this is the second chapter! I'll be posting more as I come up with them. Feel free to suggest any ideas!

 _Each chapter will be labelled with_ _ **before**_ _and_ _ **after**_ _. If I feel like it, there will even be some_ _ **during**_ _chapters. If you've watched Mr and Mrs Smith, you know that John and Jane eventually find out that the other is an assassin working for competitive agency. Before will refer to the events before they find out. During and after will be easy enough to figure out._


	3. hold me down, sweet and low

**hold me down** **,** **sweet and low** **and I will carry you home,**

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 _(after)_

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It's more morning than it is night and she's all alone in the place she works at because she has nowhere else to go. The charade has been shattered for close to three months now and while she and Laxus know what its like to miss each other, small business trips are nothing compared to this separation so daunting in its persistence.

Mirajane is finished tidying up her work and pulling down the sheets on her office's sofa bed. She thinks she'll have to find a new house soon; it's not like there's something to go back home to.

Over her body she pulls the heavy fleece— substantial in its warmth but, God, it's really not enough. Nothing can ever compare to the big arms that clutch her middle or the sharp jaw that buries itself into her neck. No warmth can ever replace Laxus, no comfort, no safety. How is it that nothing ever made her feel safer than being wrapped in the arms of the enemy?

Apropos to grief, she lets her heart clench. She lets herself cry a little bit as she misses him and then she tries to fall asleep.

* * *

The ground surges and moves under his unstable feet taking him one miraculous step at a time into the building he'd found where he supposes all the lies began and will end: his lovely wife's office. The security guards halt him, but Laxus is quick to reassure them that his wife is on the twenty-ninth floor waiting to take him home and he shows them an ID for proof of their shared last name. She still keeps it, he hopes.

"Don't call up, yeah? She's in the zone right now." he gives a saucy wink misplaced on a serious man like him. He's a loud, troublesome drunk so they let him on ahead and he ambles to the elevator.

The return to bachelorhood makes him feel like a lost boy. Domesticity is a sneaky little bitch of a drug that had made him so dependent it feels like small deaths ever time he realizes that's a thing of the past now. After the initial instinct to grab for his wife only to find a cold bed space, its no easy task to get out of Freed's guest room and try to go about life as normally as possible. Tonight without her had been hell. A man should never celebrate his birthday alone and he misses his lady too much so the night ends in too much tequila and just barely dodging a stomach pump. That, and him drunkenly seeking out the misus for whatever odd comfort he can get.

The elevator dings at his stop. More dizzy steps until he ends up at the only door he could see. He smashes his fists against the reinforced door and yells, "Mira! Open the door, I know you're in there!"

* * *

She's just falling into the clutches of sleep when alarming bangs sound from the level entryway. Mirajane is too well-trained to be anything but calm in the face of danger. Her pulse barely jumps as she jumps off her makeshift bed and arms herself with her favored 1911. She shoves a dagger in her boot for backup and slings a shotgun across her chest just in case the secondary and all other following backup defense systems fail. Her feet don't make a sound as she sprints towards the reinforced slabs of steel even though she knows its futile; Laxus already knows she's in here anyway and he probably also knows she's all alone.

Will he kill her? Does he mean to?

He probably does.

She watches him through the intercom. High definition and already running scans on any hidden weapons he might have concealed on his person. Her security system is top grade and the scan reveals not even a bb gun stuffed in his ankles. It takes her a long time to respond. Her throat is clogged with emotion and barely repressed tears so she spies him from the screen. Her husband sways and looks dazed. He is a bear of a man and the clumsiness on him looks entirely comical and alarming. Mirajane starts calculating: with his mass of 207 by 340, he could give himself a substantial fracture if he cracked his head on the wall. Maybe he could even break his neck if he hit it hard enough.

"What are you doing here, Laxus?" Her voice is tiny when she asks, but the man outside seems to pick up on it. His grin is wide and stupid when he hears her.

He has to lean against the door heavily because the brass number above the doorbell is spinning in a head ache inducing fashion. "Let me in already! I'm not talking to you over some fucking intercom. I miss you."

Mirajane bites her lip. The gun is still in her hand and another one is hanging off her shoulders. There are wall-mounted guns and ceiling-based lasers that could fire at him with just a verbal call. She is indestructible here, she knows. It's just inside where she's tender.

So she takes a deep breath and calls herself stupid for letting him in. The Elevator behind him is the only other point of entry onto this floor so before before her door's mechanisms turn, the elevator powers down and is sequestered off by missile-proof military grade quarantine glass. It's all lost on Laxus who only brightens when the door in front of him reveals Mira.

Then, its all a flurry of movement and limbs brushing. His inebriation dulls his senses enough that he can only barely process his wife's small hands fisting into his shirt and her dragging him inside, then the painful slam of his back against a chrome wall and the feel of a silencer digging into his head. The sloppy smile widens before his hand swats the gun away from his face and his face dives into to smack a kiss into her lips. At least, that's what he intends but he misses his aim and he ends up kissing an eyelid. "I'll work on that..." he says, the words rolling out in a barely comprehensible slur.

His heavy arms drape around her shoulders and he allows his form to slump on her even more. "I miss you, Mira. Is that even your real name? I don't care, I can still use it if you want me to call you that. I can pretend again. We were kinda happy pretending." his breath comes slow against her neck and the curtain of her hair, and that thing where he smells her and feels sentimental is happening again.

Mirajane doesn't know how she'll explain the cctv footage of her letting the very man she sicced her agents at and him landing a kiss on her. She's the boss, but she's not the only one with access to the tapes. She can imagine Erza's down-turned lips and Cana's noisy disapproval. But her team trusts her. She hopes they do, anyway.

What she does know is that her pulse is pounding at impossible speeds and that her chest is compressing in the way that only heartbreak can induce. Laxus is here. He's wrapped around her but it feels like it won't last.

"You're drunk, Laxus. I have no interest in refining your kissing skills. In fact, I don't really have any time to entertain you at all. I'm not killing you because you're plastered and that doesn't seem fair. I'll drive a knife into your heart when the playing ground is level." _Or when I can stop looking at you and wanting to cry."_ It seems you have nothing pressing to discuss so I'd appreciate it if you left." Her chin stabbed in the air in defiance. She refused to look at him so she trained her gaze just above his shoulder. She wonders why she can't push him off.

She tries harder so she can look him in the eye. His grey orbs are glassy but they are on her. How long has it been since he's looked at her with such open adoration? _Before he found out you killed people for a living._ "We might have been happy but just the fact that it was all pretend takes it all away. I'm done playing house."

 _Liar. You'd go back to it all if you could._ To stop herself from even thinking those foolish thoughts, she produces a cigarette case from her slacks and lights a stick. She hopes he's drunk enough not to notice her hands shake.

Her palms press flat against his chest in a moment before she pushes at him again. He wants her to stop that, but he doesn't want to fight her. "I don't wanna pretend. I want you to be Mirajane and I want to be Laxus. I want to be your husband again, but real this time. No more lies and shit. I wasn't the only one who lied," There's the bite of accusation in his tone, softened by his cotton tongue.

"I came because I miss you. I keep telling you that." He watches with a rapt fascination as she produces a white stick and puts it between her teeth. More secrets revealed. He liked Camels himself. "And it's my birthday!" The last sentence bursts out in a chipper tone, something he would have been embarrassed about if he were sober at all. But right now, nothing can matter but the feel of her soft but sturdy form against his and the look in her face that screamed strident massacre but translated like a fresh puppy love to his glazed over eyes.

He misses her. He wishes he can tell her in a way she can understand and believe him. But there is suspicion swimming in her eyes and while he can understand her disdain, it's no easier to stomach despite the one tequila, two tequila, three tequila, floor. "It's my first birthday in ten years without my wife. I was pretty sad so Freed took me to that stupid pub under his apartment. He said he was sick of hearing me cry into my pillow as I mast- no wait he told me people don't need to know that,"

Mirajane almost chokes when he cries while he gives himself hand relief. She'd have laughed if she isn't guilty of that herself. Instead, she grimaces around her cigarette. "Happy birthday," she says tartly, not proceeded by the habitual term of endearment. They couldn't have that anymore, couldn't they? There was nothing but contempt between them now.

Or so she wished. Something so achingly tender still bloomed in her heart at the sight of him so soft and silly.

"Come on, Mira. You got a chair or something? My legs feel kinda numb." As if to prove his point, he sways again.

Mirajane catches him. She always does. _Till death do us part, right?_ He is heavy but she is strong so she doesn't balk under his figure but she does curse. "If you think this is gonna be a regular thing, you've got another thing coming. After tonight, find somewhere else to nurse your hangover." Her words are harsh but she helps him to her office all the same. She slides a hand up his chest to keep him upright and matches her steps with his heavy and lazy ones. "We can't have that anymore, Laxus. That life you want can't exist between us when we know what we know. I have to kill you. If you get there first, you might kill me, too. It's the only thing that will ever exist between us now."

* * *

He desperately needs her to understand: this is the only white flag he can wave in his state. But the sterling words in his mind don't come out well. Its a slurry of embarrassing admissions and bad jokes he can see is pissing her off more than endearing him to her. Its been weeks since he's seen her, but he still knows her inside and out. On the things that mattered anyway. He knows what the thinning of her lips meant, what the tick above her brows entailed. She might be pissed but she's also trying very hard not to laugh. "No kiss for your birthday boy?" As if he's in any condition to kiss. He can't even walk a straight path. "I guess that's hoping for too much. I'll wait until you're comfortable." he's foolish in his hoping of it, and in his drunken state he finds an innocence he's though long dead shrouding him.

 _Ah, amore._

He feels his lax form sink into soft, smooth leather (last time she laid him down she'd tackled him by the waist and body slammed him into the broken glass and splinters of the chinese armiore from their parlor), her gentleness not lost on him. As is the distance she consciously places between them, hands shoving him back and walls erected so all he hears are those mechanical answers. "But I don't want to kill you, Mirajane," his tone is of a child's more things borrowed from a naive time. "I've been trying. I had bombs installed in every wall of this office. I had you at a sniper when you were walking to your car two weeks ago. And all I can think of is that stupid look on your face when you eat _kuzomochi_ " his head sinks back against the buttery armrest but his gaze never leaves hers; its a pleading, desperate thing. "You got me so fucked up. You probably don't even love me." But his arm open. They sway without his coordination but he wants her in them all the same. "My head hurts. Let me hug my wife, won't you? You still wear my ring so give me a hug, at least." he nods at the chain that fell from the neckline of her shirt, on its tip glimmering gold with promises of till death do us part he finds he cant turn his back on.

Baffled (so, _so baffled_ ) by all his admissions, Mirajane can't find her voice. So she only looks down to where wool gives way to skin and the long chain that holds her wedding band as if its some filthy little secret. Her eyes mist over. She almost forgot it hung there in the same way she does when it was still on her finger. "Why are you making this so hard?" The first tears spill over. From her conservative position sitting by his feet, her hands ball into the edge of her sweater. Maybe so she can't punch him. Maybe so she can't reach out to him. "If you really do love me, why can't you make things easier for me? We'll be hunted if we don't kill each other. We'll live the rest of our lives hiding and running and looking over our shoulders. I don't want that." _I can't imagine you in danger because of me._ "I'd rather be dead."

Something behind his ribs starts throbbing. Before Laxus can remember her current disdain for him, his instincts as her husband overpowers anything. He takes her in his arms, clumsy and jerky but the effect is the same. His heat is all-encompassing, a reprieve so great Mirajane's violent sobbing gives way to troubled breathing and then, quiet. She's so quiet even as her tears stain the collar of his shirt. Laxus wants to say something stupid. Something like, _"Then we'll keep running. We'll keep hiding and keep looking over our shoulders as long as we're together."_ But neither he nor Mirajane are stupid people. He mirrors her sentiments: he'd rather be dead than put her in crosshairs, too. Even if she would be the one to make him that way.

"Shh." His breath against her cheek stirs the gossamer of her silver hair. There's too much he wants to say but none of them appropriate. He wants to set her straight but he doesn't think he can bear to see her hurt any more than she already is, even though its his birthday and he wants to be selfish just tonight. But what was marriage that didn't put your spouse over yourself? "I'm sorry. We don't need to talk about that anymore."

Mirajane sniffles. She tells herself she doesn't detach herself from his embrace because she can't bear to look at him or or him to see her red-rimmed eyes. No, it's really not because she'll bask in his warmth until he has to go. "You have to leave in the morning."

"I know." Laxus kisses her temple.

None of them say what they think: that when he walks out that door, the war resumes.

* * *

 **note** : Another after chapter! You might want to go re-read the first chapter since i updated it to a modern au setting and changed some things around. Nothing major. Tell me how you like this chapter! You know how much of a sucker for angst I am.

 _Each chapter will be labelled with_ _ **before**_ _and_ _ **after**_ _. If I feel like it, there will even be some_ _ **during**_ _chapters. If you've watched Mr and Mrs Smith, you know that John and Jane eventually find out that the other is an assassin working for competitive agency. Before will refer to the events before they find out. During and after will be easy enough to figure out._


	4. sharp like a razor under the tongue

**sharp like a razor under the tongue**

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 _(before)_

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Mirajane is a girl who likes sharp things. In general, she likes deadly things─ the shiny barrel of a Derringer, the tantalizing shapes of spritzer bullets, the pretty illumination of a plasma laser, the artful shapes that mines make when people step on them, but she likes sharp things most. She likes the weight of a good silver letter knife in her hands and likes it even better when she drives the tip of it into that soft flesh just under the side of someone's jaw. It's rare when she brings her antiques to work but it's always fun when she does; to see the hilt of a lovely misericord sticking out of a man's chest or embedding the smooth blade of a _khanjali_ into smooth, vulnerable flesh.

Of course she is a practical killer. She has her sturdy stainless steel as well, all foreign smote and just as dashing as a seven hundred year old _katara_.

It's such a rare pleasure that she indulges herself and combines old and new. From her recent travel to Mongolia, she bears a darling carbon steel hunting knife. The handle is a newly procured Ivory to replace the rotting grip of old, uninspired bamboo. The blade is original: a hundred and sixty years old and with a gorgeous patina to prove it.

Mirajane is seated against the headboard of the bed she shares with her husband who is currently out on a business dinner, hence giving her time to play with her exquisite little toy. Oh, how her heart sings when she runs the pad of her fingers over the silky carbon steel that's endured years of use and abuse while keeping a killing edge. Mirajane almost wants to run her pinky over the deadly side of the blade and puncture herself with the pointy tip. But she can't explain a fresh cut to her husband and she can't stain the gorgeous satin sheets she's just smoothed over the bed. Laxus will worry at such a thing.

And speak of the devil.

Her husband bursts into the master bedroom, a bear of a man in such a smart-looking Fioravanti suit and spiffy Ferragamo loafers. Mirajane startles a gasp leaving her lips as she quickly stuffs the knife behind her farthest pillow. It looks like Laxus doesn't notice because there is a huge smile on his face and his eyes look a happy sort of manic as he stalks deeper into the room towards her.

"Guess who just closed a deal so fucking important my boss is gonna be sucking my dick for two weeks straight?" He's unbuttoning his jacket and tossing it on the floor and by the time he's shifting on the bed in front of her, he's already untucking his dress shirt from his pants.

Mirajane swallows back a proud smile and looks up at his with a half-assed glare instead. "I'm not sure I would like anyone else sucking your penis, sweetie." Her hands fly to his broad shoulders to smooth the unbuttoned shirt off him. "If that happens I'll have no more existential function anymore." But when her joke is over, her smile is just as large as his before she moves up to kiss him. Laxus returns it with a hungry fervor. "Congratulations. You've been working so hard on this."

At the very back of Laxus' head he thinks: _that I landed the mission to kill some hotshot Alaskan drug smuggler with a bounty on his head so big I can retire at fifty? Yeah, sure._ But of course, his sweet wife probably means his cover job: an old high rise's gut job and complete restoration and brand new landscaping. _Uh-huh. As if I know two shits between blue grass and carabao grass._

Instead of replying, he licks into her mouth, full of adrenaline that he wants to spend on her. Mira might pout and gripe about turning thirty-seven next month but she's still as hot as vat of bubbling oil. She's already slipped into a tiny nightgown and the whole look of her: bare faced, hair down and tucked into La Perla, just drives him wild.

Both of them work on getting his clothes off. She's fighting the buckle of his belt while he kicks off his shoes and socks. Laxus thinks he hears a joint on his belt snap off when she rips it open instead of sliding it up but he doesn't mind so much when he can be tasting the sweet-smelling skin of her neck. A tiny moan slips out of her mouth when he sucks at that pulse point beside her windpipe and her arms tremble a little as she tries to shuck his pants down.

It's when Laxus is shoving her onto her back and her head hits the pillows that she remembers the knife under it. "Fuck," she swears under her breath and Laxus takes this for excitement and he particularly likes it when his proper wife swears in bed so he sends her a cheeky grin before latching his mouth on her breast. Mirajane wars with pleasure and worrying about her new toy.

She can't focus much on the latter because soon enough Laxus is nudging her legs apart and ramming into her in a way that makes her arch back and her head dig back onto the pillows. No, she can't think about any of that, especially when her orgasm is building or when she finally comes when Laxus rubs on her clit.

Moments later after Laxus has rolled off her, they're panting side by side and staring dazedly at their vaulted ceiling. "Wanna get a shower together?" Laxus says as his hands smooth over the magnificent curve of her rib cage.

 _Oh, shit. The knife._ "Ah, why don't you run a bath, baby? I'll get some champagne because you're going to be buying us that sun room I want."

Laxus rolls his eyes in fake exasperation before getting up and making his way inside the en suite. "Here I thought you've gotten over that."

When Mirajane hears Laxus run the bath and get into the shower, she sits up and starts to remove the pillows. She can see the worst damage is on the back pillow, its wine-colored satin case slashed open and some of the goose feather sticking out. The blade is thankfully intact. Mirajane strokes it like an abandoned child before belting on a robe and taking it downstairs to store it in her sassy little oven compartment. "A pity about the linen," she says to herself absently as she selects a Laurent-Perrier from the wine chiller and two flutes to bring up. She'll have to be careful with her pillow placement tonight and change the sheets before she went to work tomorrow.

* * *

 **note** : I'm a dirty ass liar who promised a during chapter but I'm just having trouble finishing it.

Each chapter will be labelled with **_before_** and **_after_** _._ If I feel like it, there will even be some **_during_** chapters _._ If you've watched Mr and Mrs Smith, you know that John and Jane eventually find out that the other is an assassin working for competitive agency. Before will refer to the events before they find out. During and after will be easy enough to figure out.


	5. im just a sucker for a coldhearted lover

**i'm just a sucker for a cold-hearted lover**

 _ **.**_

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 _(after)_

 _._

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Back in the home he used to share with the other half of his heart, it's easy to be saturated in the memories they'd built there. He walks into the ruins of their threshold, untouched from when they tried to kill each other, still bearing signs of a love that went wrong. There's blood dried on the walls and the ground and the furniture. He can't really tell which is his and which is hers.

It's a chore to snap himself out of his reverie (he still sees her torn skirt and the bullet hole that punctured perfect skin; he'd put that there and made her hurt with hands and blades and guns and words) but he makes the trek up the stairs because he has a mission and he's nothing if not efficient. The hallways are streaked with blood where she struggled. On the door knob of the master suite, there is more. The room is nearly undisturbed but for the opened drawer where his wife probably took her emergency bag for cases of sudden getaways from crazy, assassin husbands. The thought brings a smile to his lips even as he heads deeper into their closet.

There is time for memories later. He needs to find a couple of diamonds.

Maybe he's used to feeling safe in this house. Here, there is no imminent threat. He's careful with his work because he has a life to protect so nothing has ever dirtied their household until he came home one night reeling from shock with murder in his mind (not that he'd been able to push through). He's unmindful of potential harm when he shifts through drawer upon drawer of his suburban cover: one of silk ties, Zegnas and Armanis and Italian Loafers. A collection of Tissot. A wall of Oxfords. The items he really wanted evade him and soon it's too late to keep searching because there is something cold and sharp at his jugular.

He can smell her before he can see her. His wife. His lovely wife has snuck up on him yet again.

Mirajane had been following him with an intent to corner and hurt him and felt a large perplexity and a crippling nostalgia when Laxus stopped in front of their old house. She loved that house. She'd built that with him after they'd made promises to each other at the altar, so utterly in love with people they didn't know. The very thought is enough to snap her out of her love-struck stupor. She'd married a man she didn't know. And now, she has a knife on his neck.

Mirajane rises on her tiptoes so she can put her chin on his shoulder, her lips at his ear, hot breath on his skin. "Check mate, darling." And just because it's too much to resist, she takes his ear lobe between her teeth and bites.

"Couldn't stay away, Mira?" comes the easy drawl of his voice but for all the neutral tones, his words are bait. "It's starting to feel that way with you popping up everywhere I go these days. And you said you'd never be the sneaky wife." the smile on his lips spread, a lethal image as he looks back at her in the reflection of his chrome shelves. She still looks beautiful. Even with her blade at his throat, she looks formidable and stunning, as a hungry lioness did.

The two of them don't move. It feels like a stalemate more than a check mate. _I don't love him, I don't love him, I don't love him._ The mantra in her head starts sounding like bad hypnotism, more and more unbelievable every time she utters it to herself. See, if she doesn't love him, it ought to be so easy to slice a pretty line across his neck, right? To see the blood of her traitorous spouse spill over his finery and to know that for once and for all, it's done. The lies, the secrets, the many years of all of that. Buried, just like he will be.

So why is it so hard?

"Mm, honey. Maybe you're just shitty at hiding yourself." Because she wanted to feel more of his skin against her, she dragged her cheek across his stubbly one. God, the _feel_ of him. It makes her ache and want more, so she presses her lips on the sharp protrusion of his cheekbones. She used to be able to do that every day for no reason at all. It's something else to miss. "Or maybe I just miss you." She means it to sound mocking and she's sure it does. But it feels right in her chest. It's the only thing she's said about him that doesn't feel like a lie these days.

He feels the juxtaposition of soft lips and cold steel on his neck and can't help but appreciate the irony of the act. "I like the sound of that second option better. I do have to wonder how you keep yourself warm these nights now."

Mirajane chuckles, something low and hot. "Don't worry, baby, I still think of you." _With her hand down her panties and her eyes closed_. Traitor or not, it was hard not to keep herself warm with thoughts of the man she'd lived with close to a decade.

There might be a blade on him but Laxus is smug enough to smile. "That's a nice thought." Slowly, his hands go up in a gesture of surrender. "Truce?"

Mirajane's eyes narrow. "Why?"

Why truce indeed? This is something Laxus can't answer as an assassin. He ought to kill her to make good on the promises between them (" _I'll kill you"_ as said that fateful night, not the vows they'd made at the little church a decade ago). He can take out the beautiful .45 by his belt and end all this; he's a quick enough draw that he can aim and squeeze before she can even gasp. But he falters and some part of his feels peaceful so with two fingers, he takes the gun and sets it on the marble island between his shoe closet and hers. "I guess I don't feel like shooting my pretty wife right now. Or maybe I want to talk alimony. Who knows?" he smirks at her, cheeky even though he has his arms up. "I promise we won't talk about our days like Suburbans do."

Mirajane withdraws from him. It seems his dark humour is enough to disarm her so she peeled herself off him but she does keep her hold on the hunting knife. "What do you want, then? If we're not going to talk about alimony or how work went? Would you like to reminisce on daydreams? Memories of the lies we've lived over the years?"

He shrugs because he doesn't know what to say to that or how to stomach the bitterness in her words. "Daydreams, huh?" Laxus thinks back on the regret that's consumed him above all, the moment files of his wife's duality had landed on his desk and he hadn't been able to stop himself from perusing more. In retrospect, he shouldn't have done that. He could have spared himself (and her) this turmoil; could still be living in a marriage that was undoubtedly built on lies but bloomed into something real. But the assassin in him had been unable to turn his back on the folders with his lady's photo. So he'd dug. And broke his own heart in the process of it all. "I said I wanted to talk. I want to know why you're here." He nods at the knife she insists on holding onto. "Are you really still following me after you've proven you can't really kill me after all these months?"

Mirajane almost doesn't reply, but she won't be the weak one here. She can't be. "I could ask you the same thing." She still feels conflict approaching their marriage: the sham of it all and what built up to it. She'd gotten his file, too, hadn't she? Freshly printed information about the Laxus Dreyar she didn't know: the one who killed for hire like she did. Cana had given her the file during briefing but to this day, it remained unopened. _"Just tell me what I need to know,"_ Mira had said wearily as she pushed the folder away and fixed her stony gaze on the data screen Levy and the logistics team presented.

 _(She knows he likes his coffee with a lot of sugar and no cream; she knows he hates basketball but pretends to like it when her brother comes over; she knows he likes silver over gold because it reminds him of her hair; she knows he loves wearing those memory foam slippers she'd bought him even though he said it was for old people; she knows he likes the freesia perfume on her because it was what she wore on their first date. She knows a lot of things about her husband. She doesn't want to know about the assassin.)_

But she has nothing now, no more strength to put up any pretense. Maybe just this once she will be honest. "I missed this place. I'd put in a lot of effort to make it homey." _We both did,_ she wants to say, but she manages to hold her tongue. "I'm curious as to why _you're_ here."

He suddenly feels shy for his reason so he shoves his hands into his pockets. A nervous habit that she notices. "I'm just looking for a silly little thing. Don't mind me." His hands ball into fists in the linen underline of his slacks. Will he tell her he's looking for comfort and memories in two tiny studs she'd given him once upon a time?

He cranes his head as if to inspect their surroundings. The immaculate state of their closet is untouched but he had to wonder about downstairs. Did she look at the ruins of their home and think it homey? Did she see their blood everywhere and think of love? "Not very homey now, I guess. I'm almost sorry for it. "

 _No, it's not._ More unsaid sentiments as she laments with him their once peaceful home. Everything she'd done here was for his comfort. The memory foam slippers she'd bought him because she wanted him to walk on clouds. The pillows she had custom made because he sometimes complained about back pain. The almost crude thread count of the linens she purchased just so he slept on the finest sheets. She'd loved him so much. Maybe she still does. This house was proof of all the little ways she cared. "Well, I _am_ sorry for it." She admits, not even feeling any lesser for it.

The small admission from her chases his heart to a gallop and he has to tell himself it can't be real. None of what she says can be. (Were her marriage vows? Were her _I Love Yous_?) "I guess I am, too." For other reasons entirely.

Leaning back, she glances away, keeping him in her peripheral so she could catch any sudden movements. "What are you looking for anyway?"

He feels bashful yet again, and he debates lying. God knows there's already a sea of lies between them, what's one more? He decides against it. He doesn't want to be a liar any more than he needs to be. "Ah… The diamond cuff links. I won't be long, if you want to stay. I'll just find them and go."

Mirajane's lips press together as she leaves her knife on the marble island with his gun and walks over to her vanity. She knows what he's talking about. The diamonds set in platinum that had cost an obscene amount of money she'd bought for their third anniversary. "I have them. I thought about throwing them away. I wasn't really sure you liked it. They didn't seem your style." Agony tears at her chest as she lifts a velvet box from inside her sunglasses drawer and tosses it to him in an underhand. How does he still have the ability to hurt her like this? "I didn't have it in me to sell them, truthfully."

The picture of the weapons together on the island looks something nostalgic and he can't place where the sentiment comes from. He thinks it's akin to seeing the rings they exchanged on the ring bearer's pillow, but that could be his loneliness and grief playing tricks on him.

 _You can't trust her. That is prelude to real death._

He's so caught up in his turmoil that he only barely catches the tiny box thrown at him. "I liked them. I wore them as much as I could without seeming like a braggart." Because what hit man went to work wearing cuff links more expensive than his whole office? "You gave these to me at a turning point of my life. I guess even I can't turn my back on sentimentality." He pockets the case, his hand clenching around the tiny thing that holds a world of grief her comfort has balmed into something sweet. "Thank you." _For this. For what it stands for. For everything._

She's nearly trembling when he aims such a tender look at her. She hates him for making it so hard to forget him. She'll have his rage, his betrayal, his secrecy. That is easier to accept because it will make hating him and disposing him easy. But this sincerity she's faced with might as well be a bullet. "Don't do that to me." She grumbles out, her voice so unstable as she fights the tears stuck in her throat. "Don't be kind to me like you're not trying to kill me. Like you haven't been lying to me all this time. Don't make me feel like you care about me. This is the most cruel thing you can do, Laxus."

Does he tell her? Does he share with her the pain stirring anew in his gut after years of coping with grief and trampling down some great, unresolved rage? Does he have it in him to be that vulnerable in front of a woman who might have comforted him, but she was a duality then. Still is.

He should stop. He can see her almost crumpling into herself with genuine grief at his gentleness. He knows how she feels. It's incredibly difficult to make an enemy of her when all he wants to do is go over there and wrap his arms around her. To tell her he doesn't want to fight anymore and he just wants to come home with her and all the ugliness be gone between them.

"I don't imagine you'd know. I never told anyone. My grandfather passed away that same day you gave these to me for our anniversary. I spent the whole day signing paperwork and planning his funeral. You were especially kind when I got home, even though I cancelled dinner and didn't even get you any flowers. Back then I thought: life sure sucks but it's not that bad when you come home to someone who loves you like this. I guess this is a nice little memorial. It felt kind of like you knew just when to back me up. So I will be thankful to you, whether you'll have it or not." Laxus looks up from where his gaze is trained on the ground. _She's so close right now._ He keeps losing track of himself gravitating towards her.

But he sees her now. It's impossible not to when he's so hyper aware of her: the smell of her, the heat she radiates, the shape of her he longs to touch again. He sees how her hands shake and he doesn't quite bite back the impulse to hold them. He steps closer, daring her to cower away from him. "And does it matter? You've chosen who you stand with." There's so much he doesn't know (maybe he's willed himself to forget) and he tells himself when he walks away from this later, it's the last time he will have to do so.

Right now, he holds her hand and urges himself to be content with this final moment.

Mirajane almost flinches at his proximity. She can't take credit for something she didn't know. But had she known better, had she known what grief he'd been going through and what really made those bags under his eyes darken, she would have tried better to be a comfort. She wishes he'd told her back then. She wishes they hadn't lied to each other so much. And suddenly it's entirely too difficult to pretend that she is his enemy. To pretend that she has it in her to hurt him when all she wants is him, him, him. It tires her to lie like this, so she just falls into him, unable to be apart anymore.

"You're right," she leans in, their lips a hair's breadth apart. "I have chosen a side."

 _Yours_. She doesn't even need to say it. Mirajane pushes herself up and slants her face over his to steal the kiss that she'd wanted to moment he showed up at her office, drunk and still in love with her.

And Laxus kisses back with equal fervor, his hands dropping hers and circling her back to draw her closer until no space exists between them, as is meant. He loves her and he'll never stop. He might have lied and omitted but he loved with all the honestly he had.

Pulling away feels impossible but the edge dies down and they settle. It's so simple to settle into each other. _Normal. Routine. A routine I will gladly go through until ol' Death takes me away._ His arms wrap around her and her chin rests on the outward curve of his chest. His forehead rests against hers, their breaths intermingling. "You've always been mine, Mira."

 _Of course,_ she wants to say, but it's already understood so she doesn't. "What do we do now?" One of her hands crawl up the curve of his spine until it tangles in the hair on his nape as she breathes him in. How comforting it is to know he still uses the same shampoo.

Laxus' stormy eyes are on her, so daring and unafraid now unlike when he was first tasked to kill his wife. Now he knows his priorities. Now he knows where his loyalties truly lie and he's not afraid to fight for them. "We fight back. We tell them to leave us alone."

Mirajane wants to sag against him, weakened by the implication. Her agency alone is a force to be reckoned with. His would be twice as much trouble. "We'll be like outlaws. We'll always have a target on our backs."

"If I have to keep running forever, I don't mind as long as you're right there with me." It's so easy to be brave now but he thinks about the possibilities, too. If she was killed, it would be her blood on his hands. Does he want that? Can he sleep knowing that? Does it matter at all, when having her in his arms feels so right?

She's scared but she nods. She understands the danger they have put themselves in with these admissions. But she's never one to take vows lightly and even the most literal and perilous aspect of 'til death do us part isn't exempt. She needs to trust in Laxus, and he in her. They will bleed but they will preserve the love that insists.

"I'm with you, Laxus. Always."

He grins, a look so happy it's almost idiotic on him. "Then you might want to take all your money out of the bank, darling. A renegade's life won't accept credit."

* * *

 **note:** I have been through the most impossibly long hospital run. I think I've been admitted more than discharged from August to October and while my health is not 100% I'm gonna force myself to go back to work since I do believe I only get sick when I'm at home. I don't want to give myself the luxury of rest because I need money to support my drinking habit and absurd furniture addiction.

Anywayyyyyy gosh im not tryna toot my own horn here but this is my fave chapter im just so gay for these idiots trying not to love each other but they do. I already have the during chapter done but I think I'm gonna post that last. This has like, 2 or 3 more chapters left before i end it.

 _Each chapter will be labelled with_ ** _before_** _and_ ** _after_** _. If I feel like it, there will even be some_ ** _during_** _chapters. If you've watched Mr and Mrs Smith, you know that John and Jane eventually find out that the other is an assassin working for competitive agency. Before will refer to the events before they find out. During and after will be easy enough to figure out._


End file.
